Better Duo: Kobe/Shaq or Kobe/LBJ?
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Which would have been the better duo?
Kobe/Shaq
58%
 58%  [ 18 ]
Kobe/LBJ
41%
 41%  [ 13 ]
Total Votes : 31

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PostPosted: Tue Jan 12, 2021 12:10 pm    Post subject: Re: Better Duo: Kobe/Shaq or Kobe/LBJ?

no magic / kareem?
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 12, 2021 12:14 pm    Post subject:

Aeneas Hunter wrote:
yinoma2001 wrote:
Agreed. But they went to 4 finals and won 2. Lakers ended up with only 3 with that dominant duo, and it fizzled rather quickly at the end too. I just think in terms of long term durability, I go with Kobe/LBJ. I don't think they get plagued with the same Kobe/Shaq problems.


Maybe, but a lot of the Kobe/Shaq problems were the result of immaturity. Shaq is still a big baby twenty years later, but Kobe grew up. If you put Kobe and Lebron together at age 18, what would have happened? I have no idea. The closest analogy I can think of is Durant and Westbrook, or maybe Lebron and Irving. The point is that history shows that these sorts of pairings are often volatile. I have a hard time imagining two guys who need the ball in their hands co-existing on a long term basis.

I know you would disagree, but I believe Kobe would have loved to have a reliable person handling the ball and scoring. It would have made his burden easier, opened things up for him, given him more rest, and gotten more wins.
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 12, 2021 12:15 pm    Post subject:

yinoma2001 wrote:
Aeneas Hunter wrote:
yinoma2001 wrote:
Agreed. But they went to 4 finals and won 2. Lakers ended up with only 3 with that dominant duo, and it fizzled rather quickly at the end too. I just think in terms of long term durability, I go with Kobe/LBJ. I don't think they get plagued with the same Kobe/Shaq problems.


Maybe, but a lot of the Kobe/Shaq problems were the result of immaturity. Shaq is still a big baby twenty years later, but Kobe grew up. If you put Kobe and Lebron together at age 18, what would have happened? I have no idea. The closest analogy I can think of is Durant and Westbrook, or maybe Lebron and Irving. The point is that history shows that these sorts of pairings are often volatile. I have a hard time imagining two guys who need the ball in their hands co-existing on a long term basis.


I think it was immaturity for sure. But Shaq never put in the work, which in turn made it so that Kobe just couldn't respect his craft. I have a hard time imagining LBJ/Kobe winning less than 3 rings combined.
less than 5 for me.
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 12, 2021 1:37 pm    Post subject:

I am a huge fan of Shaq, but to me this comes down to desire to do what it takes to win both mentally and physically every season. If Shaq had that intrinsic drive to be in the best shape he could be every year, not just in years where he thought he had something to prove, I think he would have worked on his game each offseason and had sustained success for longer. In that scenario I would go with Kobe/Shaq. In reality though, LeBron has worked on his game for longer and taken care of his body to get him to this point. I think Kobe/LeBron wins 6-7 titles if they teamed up around 2006-2008, so I’ll go with Kobe/LeBron.
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 12, 2021 1:40 pm    Post subject:

focus wrote:
Aeneas Hunter wrote:
yinoma2001 wrote:
Agreed. But they went to 4 finals and won 2. Lakers ended up with only 3 with that dominant duo, and it fizzled rather quickly at the end too. I just think in terms of long term durability, I go with Kobe/LBJ. I don't think they get plagued with the same Kobe/Shaq problems.


Maybe, but a lot of the Kobe/Shaq problems were the result of immaturity. Shaq is still a big baby twenty years later, but Kobe grew up. If you put Kobe and Lebron together at age 18, what would have happened? I have no idea. The closest analogy I can think of is Durant and Westbrook, or maybe Lebron and Irving. The point is that history shows that these sorts of pairings are often volatile. I have a hard time imagining two guys who need the ball in their hands co-existing on a long term basis.

I know you would disagree, but I believe Kobe would have loved to have a reliable person handling the ball and scoring. It would have made his burden easier, opened things up for him, given him more rest, and gotten more wins.


You're right, I do disagree. I like the theory, but a big part of Kobe's greatness was his single-minded focus. Kobe would have talked the talk, but when it came right down to it, Kobe would be Kobe. Or, looking at it another way, both Kobe and Lebron would have needed to modify their games. Would the whole have been greater than the sum of the parts, or vice versa? If Kobe really quit playing like the Kobe we remember, it might be the latter. That's my assessment of the Super Friends era Heat. Yes, they won a couple titles, but it never did work out quite the way that people expected.
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 12, 2021 1:49 pm    Post subject:

Quote:
I know you would disagree, but I believe Kobe would have loved to have a reliable person handling the ball and scoring. It would have made his burden easier, opened things up for him, given him more rest, and gotten more wins.


He wanted that the entire time, especially in the early Laker championships. The closest he got was Odom.

It's not so easy playing both roles like Kobe did alongside Shaq.
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 12, 2021 4:55 pm    Post subject:

If this is when Phil is coach as well.

Then he'd pretty much have his Jordan/Pippen duo again and we already knew what happened there.

Kobe and LeBron both would have complimented each other's game very well and Kobe would never have a reason to question LeBron's work ethic or drive. If anything they'd get along better because of that.

LeBron talks all the time about what he learned from Kobe during the Olympics and over time and how it made him change up on his approach. You make him teammates with Kobe and he's getting that from the beginning.

Then you have Phil Jackson as the coach (at least until 2010-2011) and you probably win even more.

Even after Phil retired, I think Kobe and LeBron still win chips. Kobe probably retires earlier because he'd be past 6 rings imo by that point.
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 13, 2021 2:22 pm    Post subject:

Aeneas Hunter wrote:
focus wrote:
Aeneas Hunter wrote:
yinoma2001 wrote:
Agreed. But they went to 4 finals and won 2. Lakers ended up with only 3 with that dominant duo, and it fizzled rather quickly at the end too. I just think in terms of long term durability, I go with Kobe/LBJ. I don't think they get plagued with the same Kobe/Shaq problems.


Maybe, but a lot of the Kobe/Shaq problems were the result of immaturity. Shaq is still a big baby twenty years later, but Kobe grew up. If you put Kobe and Lebron together at age 18, what would have happened? I have no idea. The closest analogy I can think of is Durant and Westbrook, or maybe Lebron and Irving. The point is that history shows that these sorts of pairings are often volatile. I have a hard time imagining two guys who need the ball in their hands co-existing on a long term basis.

I know you would disagree, but I believe Kobe would have loved to have a reliable person handling the ball and scoring. It would have made his burden easier, opened things up for him, given him more rest, and gotten more wins.


You're right, I do disagree. I like the theory, but a big part of Kobe's greatness was his single-minded focus. Kobe would have talked the talk, but when it came right down to it, Kobe would be Kobe. Or, looking at it another way, both Kobe and Lebron would have needed to modify their games. Would the whole have been greater than the sum of the parts, or vice versa? If Kobe really quit playing like the Kobe we remember, it might be the latter. That's my assessment of the Super Friends era Heat. Yes, they won a couple titles, but it never did work out quite the way that people expected.
I have the same assessment of the Heat. They didn't get three, and I expected them to (not forgetting Bosh too). Don't recall what I expected then, but maybe 4 rings. Got two and the initial year finals. Lebron wanted to go back home, so just four years. Not too shabby. They faced a (hate to say it) beautifully playing on-fire Spurs team in their revenge comeback year.

I typed a bunch more this morning but didn't send bc of work matters. I deleted the rest bc I wonder what you think of this Harden trade to the Nets with KD (maybe Kyrie) in light of what you said above (and Dinwiddie next year I guess). < sum of the parts? Doomed to underwhelm? I suppose let's just focus on offense just to keep the discussion relevant to the above (although part of my overall view is that KobeLBJ would have combined to make a spectacular defensive team too).
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 6:55 am    Post subject:

We know that Shaq/Kobe "only" (b/c they really should have more) produced 3 titles. I have a hard time believing that LBJ/Kobe would produce less than 3 titles together. I just think from a team construction standpoint, much easier to build around these two players, ergo, better chance to keep the dynasty going.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 10:22 am    Post subject:

Deleted. I thought it was Kobe/Shaq vs Bron/AC pairing without reading
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 10:45 am    Post subject:

Thought Shaq for about a half second out of nostalgia, but that's about it.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 1:28 pm    Post subject:

Kobe/Lebron would NEVER work because they both require the ball unless you want just the two of them to average 40 points game. Klay Thompson would be a better match than Kobe for Lebron because you only want a sharp shooter.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 1:30 pm    Post subject:

lakersfever714 wrote:
Kobe/Lebron would NEVER work because they both require the ball unless you want just the two of them to average 40 points game.


it worked Wade and LeBron, and Kyrie and LeBron.


So the idea it wouldn't work with Kobe and LeBron isn't exactly backed up by anything aside from a "Kobe would be too selfish" mentality which has already been proven to be false. Shaq was about as ball dominant as it got and Kobe was the one responsible with getting him the ball most of the time.

Kobe has said on more than one occasion that he always would have preferred to have an actual distributor on his team to allow him to play the off-ball role more often and attack from the reeds. It's one of the reasons he was so excited when the Lakers got Chris Paul.

It's why we know he and Chris Paul would have worked out. So I don't see where any evidence of "It wouldn't have worked with Kobe and LeBron because they were both ball dominant" came from. Because LeBron is EXACTLY the kind of player Kobe always wanted.
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Last edited by MJST on Thu Jan 14, 2021 1:32 pm; edited 1 time in total
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 1:31 pm    Post subject:

MJST wrote:
lakersfever714 wrote:
Kobe/Lebron would NEVER work because they both require the ball unless you want just the two of them to average 40 points game.


it worked Wade and LeBron, and Kyrie and LeBron.


So the idea it wouldn't work with Kobe and LeBron isn't exactly backed up by anything aside from a "Kobe would be too selfish" mentality which has already been proven to be false. Shaq was about as ball dominant as it got and Kobe was the one responsible with getting him the ball most of the time.


100%.

And Kyrie and LeBron helped beat a 73 win Warrior team too.

Imagine Kobe and LeBron? WHEW.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 2:54 pm    Post subject:

I'm not sure that Kobe/Shaq could beat the KD Warriors team.

Kobe/LBJ makes it much easier to put a team together to face that kind of squad. I think they could also beat MJ/Pippen too.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 2:55 pm    Post subject:

Our Eastern Conference foes weren't exactly all timer teams (Pacers, 76ers, Nets). Probably Kings were the toughest team we had to face, and occasionally the Spurs (Utah obviously gave us fits pre-championship run).
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 3:31 pm    Post subject:

yinoma2001 wrote:
I'm not sure that Kobe/Shaq could beat the KD Warriors team.

Kobe/LBJ makes it much easier to put a team together to face that kind of squad. I think they could also beat MJ/Pippen too.


If it's the physical 90s nba? LeBron turns one of them into a stain on the floor along with some collateral damage.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 4:21 pm    Post subject:

Hector the Pup wrote:
yinoma2001 wrote:
I'm not sure that Kobe/Shaq could beat the KD Warriors team.

Kobe/LBJ makes it much easier to put a team together to face that kind of squad. I think they could also beat MJ/Pippen too.


If it's the physical 90s nba? LeBron turns one of them into a stain on the floor along with some collateral damage.


It took a slightly post prime Magic to just be "contained" by Pippen in the Finals. MJ kept getting juked out of his shorts and couldn't handle the physicality.

Could you imagine Pippen trying to defend LeBron, basically the size of Magic, with that kind of strength/vertical/speed combination on par with MJ?

WOOF.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 6:01 pm    Post subject:

Kobe/Bron easily. Potential 20-year dominant duo and at least 6 titles. Shaq and Kobe were together for what, 8 years? Give me the most dominant scorer in NBA history paired with arguably the GOAT.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 7:35 pm    Post subject:

Kobe was Not in his Prime when he had Shaq and yet they won almost 4 rings together. How lucky for the league that it were not 2005-2012 Kobe playing with prime Shaq.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 7:42 pm    Post subject:

Lol I didnt see the kobe/lbj in the poll. Thought it were lbj/davis. Sure kobe/lbj would be good for duration. Prime kobe/lbj would be a nightmare because lbj would thrive better as he joined kobe's ethic.
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 14, 2021 8:22 pm    Post subject:

OP asks "Shaq/Kobe or Kobe/LBJ"
More intriguing is Shaq/Lebron

their ages don't really line up, but 3 peat Shaq/LBJ (post Heat) is probably the most dominant pairing by a large margin
Both are they most physically dominant at their positions, and LBJ's passing/ball handling feeding Shaq would be other worldly.
Even if you took todays Lebron and put him with 1996-2002 Shaq, that'd be a much more dominant pairing.
And Lebron wouldn't really have any problem feeding Shaq 40 times a game. Shaq's inside out passing out of the double/triple team would feed right into LBJ too
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